on a small bronze figure of
Buonaparte on the mantelpiece).

H. What, do you mean to Buonaparte?

S. Yes, all but the nose was just like.

H. And was his figure the same?

S. He was taller!

[I got up and gave her the image, and told her it was hers by every
right that was sacred. She refused at first to take so valuable a
curiosity, and said she would keep it for me. But I pressed it eagerly,
and she look it. She immediately came and sat down, and put her arm
round my neck, and kissed me, and I said, "Is it not plain we are the
best friends in the world, since we are always so glad to make it up?"
And then I added "How odd it was that the God of my idolatry should turn
out to be like her Idol, and said it was no wonder that the same face
which awed the world should conquer the sweetest creature in it!" How I
loved her at that moment! Is it possible that the wretch who writes
this could ever have been so blest! Heavenly delicious creature! Can I
live without her? Oh! no--never--never.

"What is this world? What asken men to have, Now with his love, now in
the cold grave, Alone, withouten any compagnie!"

Let me but see her again! She cannot hate the man who loves her as I
do.]

LETTERS TO THE SAME

Feb., 1822.

--You will scold me for this, and ask me if this is keeping my promise
to mind my work. One half of it was to think of Sarah: and besides, I
do not neglect my work either, I assure you. I regularly do ten pages a
day, which mounts up to thirty guineas' worth a week, so that you see I
should grow rich at this rate, if I could keep on so; AND I COULD KEEP
ON SO, if I had you with me to encourage me with your sweet smiles, and
share my lot. The Berwick smacks sail twice a week, and the wind sits
fair. When I think of the thousand endearing caresses that have passed
between us, I do not wonder at the strong attachment that draws me to
you; but I am sorry for my own want of power to please. I hear the wind
sigh through the lattice, and keep repeating over and over to myself two
lines of Lord Byron's Tragedy--

"So shalt thou find me ever at thy side Here and hereafter, if the last
may be."--

applying them to thee, my love, and thinking whether I shall ever see
thee again. Perhaps not--for some years at least--till both thou and I
are old--and then, when all else have forsaken thee, I will creep to
thee, and die in thine arms. You once made me believe I was not hated
by